GIGABYTE X99-Gaming G1 WIFI Motherboard Review
by Ian Cutress on December 18, 2014 10:00 AM ESTSystem Performance
Power Consumption
Power consumption was tested on the system while in a single MSI GTX 770 Lightning GPU configuration with a wall meter connected to the OCZ 1250W power supply. This power supply is Gold rated, and as I am in the UK on a 230-240 V supply, leads to ~75% efficiency > 50W, and 90%+ efficiency at 250W, suitable for both idle and multi-GPU loading. This method of power reading allows us to compare the power management of the UEFI and the board to supply components with power under load, and includes typical PSU losses due to efficiency. These are the real world values that consumers may expect from a typical system (minus the monitor) using this motherboard.
While this method for power measurement may not be ideal, and you feel these numbers are not representative due to the high wattage power supply being used (we use the same PSU to remain consistent over a series of reviews, and the fact that some boards on our test bed get tested with three or four high powered GPUs), the important point to take away is the relationship between the numbers. These boards are all under the same conditions, and thus the differences between them should be easy to spot.
While idle power consumption is not the lowest, peak power consumption under load nudges around the 200W barrier. The power delta between idle and load is 131W, which matches the GIGABYTE X99-UD7 WIFI numbers within a watt.
Windows 7 POST Time
Different motherboards have different POST sequences before an operating system is initialized. A lot of this is dependent on the board itself, and POST boot time is determined by the controllers on board (and the sequence of how those extras are organized). As part of our testing, we look at the POST Boot Time using a stopwatch. This is the time from pressing the ON button on the computer to when Windows 7 starts loading. (We discount Windows loading as it is highly variable given Windows specific features.)
A default POST time under 20 seconds for an X99 motherboard is quite impressive.
USB Backup
For this benchmark, we transfer a set size of files from the SSD to the USB drive using DiskBench, which monitors the time taken to transfer. The files transferred are a 1.52 GB set of 2867 files across 320 folders – 95% of these files are small typical website files, and the rest (90% of the size) are small 30 second HD videos. In an update to pre-Z87 testing, we also run MaxCPU to load up one of the threads during the test which improves general performance up to 15% by causing all the internal pathways to run at full speed.
USB 3.0 seemed a little slow in our testing compared to some other boards.
DPC Latency
Deferred Procedure Call latency is a way in which Windows handles interrupt servicing. In order to wait for a processor to acknowledge the request, the system will queue all interrupt requests by priority. Critical interrupts will be handled as soon as possible, whereas lesser priority requests such as audio will be further down the line. If the audio device requires data, it will have to wait until the request is processed before the buffer is filled.
If the device drivers of higher priority components in a system are poorly implemented, this can cause delays in request scheduling and process time. This can lead to an empty audio buffer and characteristic audible pauses, pops and clicks. The DPC latency checker measures how much time is taken processing DPCs from driver invocation. The lower the value will result in better audio transfer at smaller buffer sizes. Results are measured in microseconds.
The X99-Gaming G1 WIFI nudged the 100 microsecond barrier which is our ideal aim for X99.
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chizow - Thursday, December 18, 2014 - link
Ian, did you have a chance to thoroughly test out OC'ing on this board, and if so, what BIOS revision did you test? I did note you had a few mentions of the auto-OC feature, but I have the Gaming 5 version of this board and I have to say it is one of the hardest I have ever worked with in over a decade of custom builds. From the feedback on various forums including the Tweaktown Gigabyte BIOS thread, it seems this is pretty consistent across all of the Giga X99 boards.Some of the crazy stuff I have seen is:
1) Hard loop on bad OC settings. They have fixed this somewhat with the latest BIOS so it will usually allow you to re-enter the BIOS on a bad boot/OC. Before you had to do some janky things like disconnect all your RAIDed SATA connections or it would halt on POST and prevent you from getting into the BIOS.
2) Early versions of the BIOS did not allow for ANY overclocking. Things have improved gradually, but I have still found this board takes some 0.02-0.03V higher than other boards to achieve similar OCs. For example, an Asus board might only need 1.265V to achieve 4.5GHz, while I need 1.295V to get 4.4GHz stable.
3) Examples of "mostly" stable (ie. apps, games, stress tests) will have no problems in Windows, but they won't allow for wake from S3 Sleep. Adding more voltage allows the PC to wake but somehow the board defaults to its stock speeds, ie. does not retain overclock once it is awake. Restarting will result in the bad OC screen, showing the OC was not completely stable to begin with. Adding more voltage fixes this, but it is a lot of voltage compared to other boards.
4) This board does not like RAM speeds above the stock 2133MHz. Very disappointing, I'm using 2666MHz Corsair with XMP and this board will run, but again, will not wake from sleep or retain OC settings at higher RAM speeds. I know this is not official JEDEC spec but other boards do not have a problem with this at all. I have not yet tried to use manual settings for the timings, but I really shouldn't have to, that's what XMP is for.
5) Board would not boot at all with the auxiliary 4-pin molex connector attached.
I got this board for a great price (free), so I can't complain too much, but if I had spent my own money I would be very upset with it. I've had good experiences with Gigabyte in the past with their Z87X-UD4 and the X58-UD3R before that, but this board has been a big disappointment. There's probably at least 4-5 bugs I encountered that would've been a showstopper for a less experienced builder, so Gigabyte really needs to clean up their act, imo, because no one should have to jump through the hoops I went through to get this board working with a decent overclock.
That said, this board is probably fine for anyone who is planning to run it bone stock clocks.
BoredTech - Friday, December 25, 2015 - link
This is a game board, the oc board is the SOC from them.angrypatm - Thursday, December 18, 2014 - link
It's funny how some people are so concerned about the looks and color of a mobo, I guess they wouldn't buy it if it was brown and purple.littlebitstrouds - Friday, December 19, 2014 - link
Awe, I miss DFI boards.gammaray - Saturday, December 20, 2014 - link
i don't get it, why invest in a X99 board with a 500$ cpu when a z87 coupled with a 4770 perform just as well?Zan Lynx - Saturday, January 17, 2015 - link
Because "performs just as well" is not true? It might or it might not, but that depends on the application you're using. I'm running a 5960x overclocked to 4.1 GHz and I guarantee it will crush a 4770 like a bug.